Sunday 11 November 2018

Grand Slam group stage 2 and what we learned from day 1

I assume that it was deliberate that all the seeds on day one played all the BDO players in a 1v4, 2v3 format, which I think is a shame as it puts a heck of a lot of pressure on all the BDO players as, Durrant aside, they all lost the first game - you'd expect it to happen most of the time anyway regardless of when it happens in the group, but it's a whole different dynamic if, say, Williams beat Hopp or Payne before facing Wright. Oh well, we'll see if they can rebuild in the losers matches today, a lot of them seem like they could be live and make for an interesting final match against someone who isn't necessarily one of the PDC's top players.

Ratajski getting home against van Barneveld just put us up for the event, I don't know how long Hopp will be able to get clutch bull finishes for, seems hugely unsustainable. Today, what do we have?

Searle/McGeeney - 0.25u Searle 4/5, McGeeney did little to suggest that the numbers I have on him are inaccurate, his scoring was OK but he just couldn't hit a double. Searle did fine and ought to take this one.

Payne/Williams - No bet here, the line looks close enough to where I think it should be, Williams did just about enough, if anything Payne may be undervalued but taking Wright the distance is just about enough for me.

Schindler/Mitchell - 0.25u Mitchell 11/10, I'm going to trust the model here, even based on limited sample sizes. Mitchell wasn't too bad, although he could do with upping his scoring a touch. Looking at the losing legs season long, as Mitchell has a huge lead on winning legs albeit on a short sample, they both average within a quarter of a point of each other. That's good enough for me.

Whitlock/Gilding - Gilding, two legs where he gave Price far, far too long to win through missing four darts at double in each leg aside, was a bit better than the scoreline suggested. Whitlock really couldn't do too much against Durrant, only getting darts at double in one leg that he lost. 0.25u Gilding 9/4, the pressure's on Simon here and Gilding has a massive incentive to win.

Suljovic/Bunting - This is probably close to a Bunting bet, I had it 60/40 Suljovic before the event and nothing much has going to have changed over one game, the average from Bunting is probably a lot better but for that mutual comedy first leg - 0.25u Bunting 2/1, that's a decent price in a short race.

Cross/van den Bergh - It's weird that the projections had Dimitri winning 40% of the time, and that's exactly where the line is. Will pass.

Price/Durrant - Line again looks close enough with Glen being a small favourite.

Wright/Hopp - 0.25u Wright 5/11, it's only a small bet because I don't think our edge is that huge, only getting Wright at 73%, Wright was pretty tidy barring one leg on throw and was pressuring Williams quite well so he should get home here.

Hine/Unterbuchner - Nothing here. Hine's probably one of the weakest PDC players in the field and Unterbuchner can be dangerous, but Hine still ranks well enough that he only projected as a small underdog and while Hine was pretty average against White, Michael wasn't doing anything amazing in a loss to Anderson either.

Murnan/Robson - Pick your poison here, I could barely split them, albeit off of a small Robson sample, the bookies can't either, let's just leave it alone.

Webster/Harms - Now we come to a BDO player with an even smaller sample than Robson, not sure I want any piece of this with Mark being the very slight favourite - Harms was at least scoring alright which may give him darts against Webster, which he didn't really get against Wade until it was too late, while Webster wasn't great at all and could easily have lost 5-0 himself. Avoiding, if only because Harms may already think he's out. Then again, if that gives him no pressure...

van Barneveld/Smith-Neale - Adam had a couple of OK scoring legs and a couple of duff scoring legs to start against Smith, which was enough to put him 4-0 down, he fought back a bit but it was too late then, Barney was there or there abouts in the legs that Ratajski won, I'm thinking Barney showed enough that I don't want to bet on the new World Master, which I'll probably regret.

Wade/Brown - 0.25u Brown 5/2, sure Wade is winning of late but Wade is nowhere near that big of a favourite here. If he'd smashed Harms out of the park then maybe, but he didn't, Brown simply cannot miss as many doubles as he did last night though.

Smith/Ratajski - Had Smith at 65%, he's 8/15, seems good enough a line to me.

van Gerwen/Clayton - 0.1u Clayton 9/1, is Clayton more than a one in ten shot? Over a race to five? Maybe on current form this happens less than the season long projections suggest, which includes Clayton beating van Gerwen in a best of eleven, but hey, stranger things have happened and it's not as if Clayton hasn't played van Gerwen on TV before. It's close to a free hit for the Ferret knowing he'll come back against Robson last game regardless.

Anderson/White - 0.25u White 23/10, it's White on TV but he chucked well yesterday so he should win this more than the roughly 30% of the time he'd need to for this bet to be profitable.

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